News & Updates

Despite trepidation from some in the legal community around the idea of nonlawyers providing legal services, newly released data from Utah's sandbox proves those fears unfounded—and that, in fact, the opposite is true. Sandbox providers are bringing a variety of safe legal services to thousands of consumers.

Last week, IAALS met with the other members and staff of the Conference of Chief Justices Civil Justice Improvements committee for its second plenary meeting in Washington D.C. The meeting was followed by the National Center for State Court’s Judicial Excellence Events, and culminated in an award ceremony where Chief Justice John Roberts presented the William Rehnquist Award to Kansas Judge Steve Leben, a close friend of IAALS, at the Supreme Court.

IAALS Executive Director Rebecca Love Kourlis, a graduate of Stanford University and Stanford Law School (BA '73, JD '76), was recently profiled in the Stanford Lawyer. The article takes a look at her career, including her years on the bench and her decision to leave the bench to found IAALS.

Last week, IAALS gathered with our partners and friends for our 14th Annual Rebuilding Justice Award Dinner. We were thrilled to welcome people back in person after three years to celebrate this year’s honorees, as well as recognize our collective efforts to build a more accessible, fair, and efficient civil justice system.

Social and mainstream media is abuzz with coverage of a recent segment on HBO's Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, in which Oliver skewers judicial elections. With clips of campaign ads that range from the absurd to the appalling, and extreme examples of the tactics some judicial candidates have used to garner campaign contributions, Oliver shines a hilarious but no less accurate light on the "horrifying spectacle" of judicial elections.

After the governor failed to make a judicial appointment within the 30 day limit, the judicial selection commission made the appointment from its list of well-qualified nominees. The governor had selected the same nominee, but he was two days late in doing so.

Allied legal professional programs have the potential to diversify the legal services market and create more cost-effective legal service models, and they should be created as an important part of a broader legal service ecosystem.

The 2015 Annual Meeting of The Association of American Law School (AALS), entitled Legal Education at the Crossroads, provided much discussion around the critical choices facing law schools. Alli Gerkman, Director of Educating Tomorrow’s Lawyers, was…

Eleven of 12 court of appeals judges and two of five supreme court justices have recused themselves from hearing an appeal involving a constitutional challenge to the state’s process for selecting appellate judges. John Jay Hooker, who filed and lost a similar suit in the late 1990s, claims that the constitution requires judges to be elected rather than appointed and that elections should be by grand division rather than statewide.

IAALS' new board members bring a wealth of diverse perspectives and expertise, furthering our momentum and dedication to our mission of realizing a modern, equitable, and accessible legal system.

Starting today, IAALS, the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System at the University of Denver, in partnership with NEWMEDIA, a Denver-based full-service website design and development agency, has a new online home to showcase its…

In a guest post on Justice at Stake's Gavel Grab, Natalie Knowlton (Manager, Quality Judges Initiative) discusses the release of IAALS' Cornerstones of State Judicial Selection: Laying the Foundation for Quality Court Systems and Judges. Cornerstones…

Sonja Ebron discusses the challenges of a complex civil justice system, unifying varied perspectives, and why access to justice is personal. The wide breadth of IAALS’ partnerships is integral to our work, and we’re excited to showcase our board members’ dedication and expertise.

In response to record-breaking judicial election spending, and an unprecedented series of scandals involving supreme court justices, reform-minded folks in Pennsylvania are making historic strides toward change.

A group of retired supreme court judges took the lead in the campaign opposing Amendment 3, a proposed constitutional amendment that would allow the governor to name an additional member of the commission that nominates potential judges and increase the number of nominees from three to four.

We at IAALS are deeply saddened by the passing of Daniel L. Ritchie, one of our founders. IAALS is incredibly grateful for the vision and inspiration he brought both to IAALS’ founding and to its future, and we’re committed to championing the values he held dear in our work.

The Utah Supreme Court has approved the development of a new program to help litigants navigate the court system. A Supreme Court Task Force established to examine the issue recommended that Limited Paralegal Practitioners (LPPs) be authorized to assist clients with filling out legal forms and preparing settlements, among other tasks, in certain areas of the law, including family law. 

Ruth Bettelheim, a marriage and family therapist, wrote in the New York Times that children’s voices are being ignored or suppressed in custody discussions and agreements. She argues that a custody arrangement generally governs the schedule of children without change until they turn 18, despite the fact that the needs of children change as they get older.

In 2012, when I first started researching Splitopia, my book on today’s good divorce, I assumed there were dearth of good ideas around for helping families transition out of marriage smoothly. It would be my job, I decided, to develop new thinking for the age-old problem of marriage’s end. Upon further investigation, I discovered that many legal professionals, reformers, and mental health practitioners did have good ideas for helping adults and children navigate this difficult transition, but they weren’t communicating them adequately between disciplines and across states, let alone to divorcing families. I would start a national divorce communication program, perhaps affiliating with a think tank in Washington, D.C.!

The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) has published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking in the Federal Register. The ITC's proposed rules apply to 337 investigations, which involve allegations that a competitor is importing patent-infringing goods. The proposed rules closely follow the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and seek to "make patent-infringement disputes more affordable by placing limitations on electronic discovery."